'I hev los' my faith!' he cried out, with a poignant despair. 'God ez gin it—ef thar is a God—hev tuk it away. You-uns kin go on. You-uns kin b'lieve. Yer paster b'lieves, an' he'll lead ye ter grace—leastwise ter a better life. But fur me thar's the nethermost depths of hell, ef'—how his faith and his unfaith tried him!—'ef thar be enny hell. Leastwise——Stop, brother,'—he held up his hand in deprecation, for Parson Tobin had risen at last, with a white, scared face; nothing like this had ever been heard in all the length and breadth of the Great Smoky Mountains—'bear with me a little; ye'll see me hyer no more. Fur me thar is shame, ah! an' trial, ah! an' doubt, ah! an' despair, ah! The good things o' life hev not fallen ter me. The good things o' heaven air denied. My name is ter be a by-word an' a reproach 'mongst ye. Ye'll grieve ez ye hev ever hearn the Word from me, ah! Ye'll be held in derision! An' I hev hed trials—none like them ez air comin', comin', down the wind. I hev been a man marked fur sorrow, an' now fur shame.'
He stood erect; he looked bold, youthful. The weight of his secret, lifted now, had been heavier than he knew. In his eyes shone that strange light which was frenzy, or prophecy, or inspiration; in his voice rang a vibration they had never before heard.
'I will go forth from 'mongst ye—I that am not of ye. Another shall gird me an' carry me where I would not. Hell an' the devil hev prevailed agin me. Pray fur me, brethren, ez I cannot pray fur myself. Pray that God may yet speak ter me—speak from out o' the whurlwind.'
There was a sound upon the air. Was it the rising of the wind? A thrill ran through the congregation. The wild emotion, evoked and suspended in this abrupt pause, showed in pallid excitement on every face. Several of the men rose aimlessly, then turned and sat down again. Brought from the calm monotony of their inner life into this supreme crisis of his, they were struck aghast by the hardly comprehended situations of his spiritual drama enacted before them. And what was that sound on the air? In the plenitude of their ignorant faith, were they listening for the invoked voice of God?
Kelsey, too, was listening, in anguished suspense.
It was not the voice of God, that man was wont to hear when the earth was young; not the rising of the wind. The peace of the golden sunshine was supreme. Even a tiny cloudlet, anchored in the limited sky, would not sail to-day.
On and on it came. It was the galloping of horse—the beat of hoofs, individualized presently to the ear—with that thunderous, swift, impetuous advance that so domineers over the imagination, quickens the pulse, shakes the courage.
It might seem that all the ingenuity of malignity could not have compassed so complete a revenge. The fulfilment of his prophecy entered at the door. All its spiritual significance was annihilated; it was merged into a prosaic material degradation when the sheriff of the county strode, with jingling spurs, up the aisle, and laid his hand upon the preacher's shoulder. He wore his impassive official aspect. But his deputy, following hard at his heels, had a grin of facetious triumph upon his thin lips. He had been caught by the nape of the neck, and in a helpless, rodent-like attitude had been slung out of the door by the stalwart man of God, when he and Amos James had ventured to the meeting-house in liquor; and neither he nor the congregation had forgotten the sensation. It was improbable that such high-handed proceedings could be instituted to-day, but the sheriff had taken the precaution to summon the aid of five or six burly fellows, all armed to the teeth. They, too, came tramping heavily up the aisle. Several wore the reflection of the deputy's grin; they were the 'bold, bad men,' the prophet's early associates before 'he got religion, an' sot hisself ter consortin' with the saints.' The others were sheepish and doubtful, serving on the posse with a protest under the constraining penalties of the law.
The congregation was still with a stunned astonishment. The preacher stood as one petrified, his eyes fixed upon the sheriff's face. The officer, with a slow, magisterial gesture, took a paper from his breast-pocket, and laid it upon the Bible.
'Ye kin read, pa'son,' he said. 'Ye kin read the warrant fur yer arrest.'